Food casings based on artificial materials such as cellulose, plastic and textile have been used for decades for the production of food products such as various types of sausages.
Current food safety standards, such as the European packaging directive, require that such food casings be provided with a traceability code that allows the food casings to be traced for safety reasons. Such a traceability code may contain information concerning e.g. units, batches, production dates, or equipment used for production.
However, it has been found that such traceability codes may cause unforeseen problems with end users of the food casings containing such traceability codes. For instance, consumers of the final food product packaged in a food casing containing a marking with a traceability code may be confused to falsely believe that the marking with a traceability code indicates shelf life of the final food product. This may lead to reduced customer acceptance or unnecessary returns or disposals of the final food product. A conceivable solution to this problem could be e.g. a marking with a traceability code, such as a label, that could be removed from the food casing before the final food product packaged in the food casings is provided to end users. However, such removable markings with traceability codes are difficult to implement in a practical way for food casings that undergo various processing steps during their manufacture and use. Furthermore, a removable marking with a traceability code is not desirable when the food casing should be traceable throughout its life cycle.